With the Government of the Philippines (GPH) and the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP) Peace Process hitting a wall over the continued detention of NDFP "consultants," it has been a year since anything substantiative has taken place between the two Peace Panels. Truth be told, the Aquino Administration's gameplan was primed for failure since day one. For starters, as I have noted in past entries, President Aquino has officially laid out his bets on the dual Peace Processe tracks, this and the GPH-MILF Peace Process. Internal documents, such as the "Philippine Development Plan 2010-2016" show that Aquino has no expectations of progress on the GPH-NDFP track. Instead he has placed all eggs in the GPH-MILF basket. With the NDFP, these same documents articulate a program of delaying the NDFP track to take advantage of any lulls gained, and to weaken the NDFP/CPP/NPA. Even if the documents had never been leaked, given the fact that Aquino has set a 36 month window for an FPA, or Final Peace Agreement, his endgame was clearly telegraphed, the so called "GPH-NDFP Peace Process" never had an inkling of a chance. Not wanting to be misconstrued as some sort of CPP/NPA/NDFP cheerleader, let me emphasize that the NDFP also re-entered the Peace Process in bad faith. Still, if we are measuring responsibility in degrees, the NDFP comes out of this imbroglio smelling like (red) roses.
The two Peace Panels last met, or rather the ONLY time they have met since the Process began again, was in February of 2011 (see "GPH-NDFP Peace Process for the First Quarter of 2011"). There were smiles, hand shakes and guffaws enough to go around, but nothing was really acccomplished. Of course, after a half decade of inactivity all that really mattered was that the two sides were in fact talking. Both sides agreed that the first item to be tackled would be CASER, or the Comprehensive Agreement on Socio-Economic Reforms. June of 2011 was set for the next Formal Round, at which point each side's RCW, or Reciprocal Working Committee (RCW-SER, or RCW on Socio-Economic Reform) would present their product, the Panels would then compare them, revise them, and send them back to the mill for a September of 2011 delivery date. At that point, CASER would be signed and the next CA, or Comprehensive Agreement would go to the mat.
Not long after the February Formal Round however, the NDFP threw a hissy fit over the continued incarceration, and GPH inactivity over, NDFP Peace Panel Consultants. JASIG, or the Joint Agreement on Safety and Immunuty Guarantees is a 1995 bilateral agreement that ostensibly protects declared NDFP Peace Panel Consultants. Per JASIG, (JASIG Supplemental signed on June 26th, 1996), Consultants are issued ID documents under pseudonyms in order to facilitate travel in relation to their duties vis a vis the Peace Process. The NDFP is obligated to furnish a list of pseudonyms and their ID numbers, while maintaining a masterlist upon which each pseudonym is linked to a Consultant's legal name. In addition, a photograph of each Consultant was to be included. The identifying documents and photos were stored in a bank safety deposit box in Utrecht, the Dutch city that serves as the CPP/NPA/NDFP capital in exile.
After that Formal Round in February of 2011, the JASIG issue came to a head as the Government called the NDFP's bluff, asking it to prove its claims about listed incarcerated personalities being JASIG protected. On a cold winter's day, representatives from both sides met at the bank in question, in the presence of a representative from the Norwegian Government, the Facilitating entity in the Peace Process, as well as the Archbishop of Utrecht. When the envelope was opened not only were there no photos, but the masterlist was contained on floppy discs, having been compiled in 1996.
When the group attempted to verify the contents of the discs they found nothing but undecipherable gibberish. The NDFP muttered something about corrupted files while the Government clicked its heels and did a jig.
Naturally the Government was elated and rubbed the NDFP's face in it. Whereas the Government might have taken the high road and offered a conciliatory gesture, say, releasing five of the then eighteen "Consultants," and labeled it a Good Will Gesture, it simply belittled the NDFP for trying to hoodwink the "Philippine people," as if any Government has ever represented anyone but the rich antd powerful. The NDFP then had no choice but to throw up its blood soaked hands and cry foul.
The next Formal Round, as noted, had been scheduled for June of 2011 but ended up scrapped over the JASIG brouhaha. On September 6th, 2011, as the window for the signing of CASER closed, the Norwegian Ambassador to the Philippines, Knut Solem, brought each Peace Panel's Chairperson-Alexander "Alex" Padilla for the GPH and Luis Jalandoni for the NDFP-together at his Residence in Makati for an informal tet a tet in an attempt to break the then 7 month impasse. While the day went smoothly, it failed to do much of anything. Indeed, the Peace Process was once again dead in the water until NDFP Consultant Jaime Soledad was re-arrested, an incident that counter-intuitively broke the stalemate.
Originally, Soledad had been arrested in March of 2008 after a cousin of his wife Clarita Luego Soledad lured the couple to Cavite on Luzon. At the time Soledad was the NPA's Secretary (top commander) of the Southern Leyte Front, a provincial wide unit, and held a seat on the EXCOM, or Executive Committee for Eastern Visayas. Nabbed on murder charges relating to a mass grave in his town of residence, Inopacan, in Leyte. The grave, one of many, was from the orgiastic purges instituted the late 1980s by the NPA after an uber-rapid expansion in both the NPA, and its political wing, the Communist Party of the Philippines, or CPP. This expansion led to paranoia about so called DPAs, or Deep Penetration Agents. The warrant, under a case eventually docketed as CC#262163 (Regional Trial Court Branch #32 in Manila) was based solely upon a single affadavit from an alleged survivor of the particular purge which led to the Inopacan Killing Field. According to the witness, Soledad figured prominently in what the CPP/NPA tend to call a "People's Court."
As a concession on the JASIG stalemate, the GPH Peace Panel, via former Panelist, attorney Pablo Sanidad, effected Soledad's release in July of 2011. The joy Soledad must have experienced was no doubt diminished greatly when, on May 2nd, 2012, he was re-arrested on murder charges. Needless to say, this did nothing to help break the impasse.
Then, a month before, on April 3rd, 2012, an NDFP Consultant named Renante Gamara was nabbed by the PNP, or Philippine National Police CIDG-NCR (Criminal Investigation and Detection Group from PRO, or Police Regional Office National Capital Region). He and a friend, Santiago Balleta, were talking outside a mall parking garage when eight plain clothes opetatives quickly bundled the pair into an SUV and sped away. A co-founder of the labor movement Kilusang Mayo Uno (May 1st Movement), he was involved in above board labor activism. Yet, he was atrrested by virtue of a May of 2007 warrant taken out in the municipality of Mauban, in Quezon Province. That warrant for murder, was sworn out against a John Doe with thirty nine aliases. Only on March 23rd, 2012 was the warrant ammended to included Gamara's name.
Clearly, the GPH-NDFP Peace Process was tottering on the edge of the abyss. Norway, the Facilitating entity, once again held out its hands to pull both Peace Panels back from danger. Inviting both Chairpersons, Alex Padilla for the GPH, and Luis Jalandoni for the NDFP. Each Chairperson brought two Panelists:
GPH
1) Efren Moncupa
2) Jurgette Honculada
NDFP
1) Fidel Agcaoili
2) Julieta de Lima
In addition, each Panel brought two Consultants:
GPH
1) Paulyn "Meiling" Paredes Sicam, journalist and peace activist who in 1987 helped found the "Coalition for Peace" after the GPH-NDFP Peace Process hit its initial impasse under President Aquino's mother Corazon. Then, in the early 90s Ms.Sicam became the Commisioner on Human Rights, filling in when the previous Commissioner became Ombudsman. In February of 2005 then President Arroyo plucked her from relative obscurity and gave her aseat on the Peace Panel in the GPH (at that time it was "GRP," for "Government of the Republicof the Philippines)-NDFP Peace Process. When that track stalled out just a couple of months later, Ms.Sicam sank back into obscurity. Still, when the GPH Peace Panel was re-constituted, she was offered a consultancy and as we see, accepted it.
n2) Maria Carla Villarta, Director of the GPH Peace Panel Secetariat.
NDFP
1) Jose Maria "Joma" Sison, Political Consultant. Joma of course is the founder of the CPP, NPA, and NDFP and remains the movement's chief ideologue
2) Rachel F.Pastores, Legal Consultant, Director of the Public Interest Law Center and highly visible on the above board left in Metro Manila.
In addition, former Senator Wigberto "Bobby" Ebarle Tanada Sr. was there by invitation of the GPH Peace Panel. Tanada, usually referred to as "Ka Bobby" (Comrade Bobby), at least by his admiring colleagues on the Philippine Left. Tanada's father, Lorenzo "Tanny" Martinez Tanada, the Philippines' longest serving senator, is an iconic figure for both the above board Left, or in Philippine speak, "Legal Left, as well as the Nationalist Right. In 1978 Lorenzo became the General Campaign Manager for LABAN (the acronym means "Fight" but stands for "Lakas ng Bayan," or "Strength of the People").
That year was a pivotal year for the opposition to then dictator Ferdinand Marcos. In April the Congressional Election was beset by loud accusations of ballot rigging. Lorenzo was at the forefront of nearly 500 demonstrators who mobbed the Batasang Pambansa, as the Congressional Building in Metro Manila's Quezon City is known. That role earned Lorenzo an arrest by the AFP, or Armed Forces of the Philippines. 1978 was the beginning of the end for Marcos and his henchmen. In 1985 Lorenzo went on to co-found Bagong Alyansa Makabayan (The New Patriotic Alliance).
Wigberto did not fall very far from the tree. Serving first as a Senator, and then as a Congressman representing the Fourth District of Quezon Province. In 2001 Wigberto attempted to regain his Senatorial seat but lost and thereafter has devoted his time to his lawfirm and to his executive leadership position in a concrete manufacturing concern. In 2004, his son Lorenzo "Erin" Reyes Tanada III assume that same Congressional seat in 2004. In the Philippines, even the Left is dominated by wealthy political dynasties.
Wigiberto Tanada recommended to both Peace Panels that one way in which to possibly build momentum might be to finally implenent a bilateral document entitled "Joint Agreement in Support of Socio-Economic Projects of Private Development Organizations," though both sides would essentially be starting from scratch since any NGOs willing to participate in this scheme when it was signed would have probably jumped ship during the fourteen year interim. Moreover, although both sides did sign it, neither one ever ratified it. Ergo, seeing as how CASER has become bogged down in perphreal issues-like JASIG-why would anyone imagine that the two Peace Panels now attempt to wade into yet ANOTHER Joint Agreement? Tanada should stick to concrete and leave absolutely crucial political dynamics alone.
With the conclusion of the two day meeting came more vague pronouncements about the need to meet again. With JASIG going nowhere, that is not likely to happen.
No comments:
Post a Comment